In June 2026, Monterey Park became the first city in America to permanently ban new data centers. Residents didn’t just pack city council meetings for months—86 percent voted to forbid a building that would never enroll children in local schools, clog rush-hour traffic, or ask the city to build another park, library, or recreation program....

If you listen to the buzz in progressive state capitols and city halls across the country, or read Ezra Klein’s Abundance, you’d think our biggest problem is a crisis of state capacity. Klein, and a growing number of progressives, share a vision of a liberalism that builds. They argue that the government has become proficient...

This past summer, the National Civic League published an article entitled “Is It None of Our Business?” The purpose of the article was to evaluate whether local government agencies should be undertaking national issues, which the League characterizes as “the ‘nationalization’ of local government matters.” The League concludes that such nationalization constitutes a “positive phenomenon.”...